Global Moorings: April 2013

The Quick Facts:

* Spent all day on April 23^rd traveling from Siem Reap to Bangkok: a 2 hour taxi ride to the Cambodia border, a long line at Thailand immigration, followed by a 6 hour rickety train ride from the Thai/Cambodia border point to Bangkok
* April 24^th we devoted to seeing the sites in Bangkok: the Grand Palace (which houses a beautiful emerald Buddha statue that was ripped off from Laos and simply never returned), Wat Pho (famous for a huge reclining Buddha statue), a boat trip on the river, and Wat Traimit (famous for a solid gold Buddha statue)
* Spent one night at the @ Hua Lumphong hostel, located right next to the train station; hotel was average; we chose it because of its proximity to the train station given our overnight train booking to get from Bangkok to Chiang Mai; absent its location, there are definitely better places to stay in the city

The Good:

* Bangkok is a bustling city with some great architecture and even better food

The Bad:

* The hustlers. In the span of two hours after leaving our hotel the first day, four separate people tried to scam us, each with a variation on the same theme: (1) the site you are trying to see is closed until the afternoon, (2) have you seen this other site, (3) I can arrange a taxi for you and show you around the city. The outright lying (in one case being told the Grand Palace is closed as we stood outside the gate to the Grand Palace with a guard right there) is almost shocking, and very disappointing. Once you get used to ignoring these people and knowing what to say to get them to leave you alone, it’s OK.

Our trip to Bangkok began at the Cambodia/Thailand border in Poipet, Cambodia, which we got to by hiring a taxi from Siem Reap to Poipet, a 2.5 hour trip. Once we got to the border, this was the scene at the border point and the line to get through Thai immigration:

We finally made it into the country, and had to then take a tuk-tuk to the train station:

Once at the train station, here is our train and some pictures from the trip, which included the nicest Thai man who sat across from us and constantly tried to talk to us (despite him not knowing too much English) and making sure all of the other Thai people and train personnel took care of us:

We finally made it to Bangkok at 8PM that night, and were quite tired. The next day we tried to pack in as much sightseeing as possible before our overnight train for Chiang Mai left at 7:30PM. Our first stop was the Grand Palace, which was quite beautiful. However, the crowds and chaos of the place are at a level I thought only reserved for Disney World and, you know, hell…

And then they made Carrie rent a sarong because her pants were too tight, this made her very happy.

And here are some of the sites.

This is a model of Angkor Wat (see previous post for the real thing!).

And this structure (Wat Phra Kaeo) houses the Emerald Buddha statue, of which we of course were prevented from taking pictures.

After the palace, we walked to Wat Pho, Thailand’s oldest temple. It is famous for housing this huge statue of a reclining Buddha that is 45 meters long. The smile is 5m long. And its feet (eew!) are inlaid with mother-of-pearl.

Wat Pho also provided the grounds for a huge market which was fun to walk through.

After lunch, we grabbed a quick boat ride on the water taxi system (ie cheapest way to get on the water without having to pay for your own longboat “tour”):

Finally, we saw Wat Traimit, which is famous for housing a golden Buddha statue. The statue is over 3 meters tall (~10 feet) and weighs 5.5 tons. It was made in the thirteenth century and spent several hundred years encased in stucco to protect it from marauders. Now it just sits in the middle of Bangkok, waiting for George Clooney and Brad Pitt to come steal it…

And that was our day. We finished by heading back to the Hualamphong train station for our overnight trip up north to the city of Chiang Mai.

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The Quick Facts:

* Took the ~5 hour van ride from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap (and, yes, it was as uncomfortable as it sounds)
* Spent the first afternoon getting our bearings in Siem Reap, and visiting some of the more modern temples in town
* Days 2 and 3 were dedicated to exploring the temple ruins in Angkor, which is a short taxi or bike ride away from Siem Reap; Day 1 we took a tuk-tuk to some of the temples further away, Day 2 we set out on mountain bikes which was a lot of fun
* Stayed at the Shadow of Angkor II which, despite a bonehead manager, proved to be a decent place from which to base our operations

The Good:

* The temples! They really are amazing feats of architecture and engineering, not to mention beautiful in their jungle setting

The Bad:

* It being the hot season here, we had to set out early in the morning (6AM) so we could be back by 1PM or 2PM because it got too hot out there

Not much to say other than we spent two days exploring the temples in Angkor. The temples were all built in the 800 – 1100 AD range by Cambodian kings, then abandoned as Thailand invaded/raided, then “rediscovered” after the fall of the Khmer Rouge empire. It is now a popular tourist site. There are over 100 temples in Angkor spread over ~3000 square kilometers, the most famous being Angkor Wat, which is the largest (it means “city that is a temple”) and is really an accomplishment of architecture and engineering.

Here are the picture highlights, starting with Angkor Wat:

This is the gate to Angkor Thom:

These are from Bayon, which is in Angkor Thom…I like the faces, which are not in too many of the temples we visited.

This is from Pre Rup, which has a temple at the top of some fairly steep and tall stairs, making it a popular destination to watch the sunset (which we did of course!).

These are from Banteay Srei, which is unique for its red color (a wonderful contrast against the dense green jungle):

And these are from Ta Prom, famous because it is slowly being “reclaimed” by the jungle. When we got there, it seemed as if the temple had been reclaimed by Asian tourists!

With so many, it was only possible to take pictures of the tourists at times. Here is my favorite: an Asian woman holding a camera like it’s some photon gun from Star Trek while sporting pink heels (you know, what *else* are you going to put on your feet while exploring temple ruins in the jungle?!?).